


Stabbed in the Back: Stuck Between a Rock and a Hard Place

by Rosemarycat5



Category: Original Work
Genre: Arthurian legend - Freeform, Avalon - Freeform, Clarent, Excalibur, Gen, Norse Mythology - Freeform, Swords, The Sword in the Stone (Arthurian Legend), Valhalla, Valkyrie - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-27 11:13:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15684291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosemarycat5/pseuds/Rosemarycat5
Summary: Introducing Arthur's famous blade. No, not Excalibur. Clarent, a bitter crabapple, tells his story.





	Stabbed in the Back: Stuck Between a Rock and a Hard Place

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Selden](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Selden/gifts).



You may have heard of King Arthur, who pulled a beautiful carved sword out of a rock and used it to gain his kingship. That sword was named Excalibur, right?

No.

It was not Excalibur. Honestly, that filthy lake-sword gets all the credit when it was I who really made Arthur Pendragon great. My name is Clarent.

I remember back in my days as a hunk of metal when everything was peaceful and calm. Then the Sons of Ivaldi chose me to be their next masterpiece (read: victim). Have you ever been forged? Because let me tell you, it's rough. They heat you up, and then just crush you with a hammer. A truly once-in-a-lifetime torture experience. After I was forged, I was left on my own for a while and got to know many of the other blades and weaponry that lived in the shop. You've heard of Odin's spear? Man, could I tell you stories about him.

After a time, I was presented to my first wielder (and my only female one), a valkyrie known as Hjörþrimul or "Sword Warrior." I was and still am very fond of her. We worked together perfectly to create an ideal fighting unit. Sometimes, she would even let me choose who would go to Valhalla. We had this little thing known as "communication." Never was there a fight we didn't strategize together. To fly through the sky once more, to smell the iron of blood and weapons in the heat of the battle once again - well, it would be far better than the life I live now.

After I had been a valkyrie blade for a couple hundred years, my edge became dull and my thick blade thin; I was too fragile to be sent back to battle. Hjörþrimul wore me one final time at a feast of mead and meats in Valhalla before I was sent off to Alfheim for storage.

Okay, so Alfheim has some complicated socio-political ties to Avalon that I don't really want to get into. But just know that sometimes, if people in high places in either world put in an order for something, the powers that be will make it happen.

Now, Merlin, Avalon's pride and joy, put in an order for a lovely blade that had seen battle but was fit for a king. Apparently, I was just who they were looking for. I was presented to Merlin, who had me taken to a forge and _carved._ He had the nerve to write on my blade. That's like if somebody took you to their house and just tattooed you. And bought you on the slave market. So at this point, I really hate Merlin. Plus he has a stupid beard.

I really don't get him: he goes to all that work writing on me only to stick me in a rock. A rock. Once more for the people in the back: a ROCK. And the people of Camelot were just as puzzled as I was. They were like, "Merlin aren't you supposed to be wise? Why are you letting the weaponry elect the king?", but whatever, I was in that rock for years. Do you know how boring rocks are? They have no imagination, no complex thought, and, oh yeah, they never talk to me!

Fast forward to this big jousting day. People are excited and grabbing weapons. I see Arthur, who's the scrawny brother of Sir Kay, running around in a panic. Then he runs to me and just pulls me out of the rock. I was shocked. Shocked, I say. I was rooting for Sir Kay to pull me out because he had spunk, but all I got was his bratty little brother.

And thus I had my most famous wielder, King Arthur. This probably would have been fine save for the fact that I was pretty much decoration on his belt, the shiny bauble that proved his kingship. I really did try to bond with Arthur, for we both had a lust for battle yet were forbidden to fight and risk ourselves. He would never listen to me; it was as if he heard not a word I said. I was merely a piece of dulled, carved metal to him. This boring indifference to me was not what made me into the bitter crabapple I am today, though. That credit goes to my final battle and the erasure that followed.

On one of Arthur's rare quests, he encountered the king Pellinore. It felt great to battle once again, two jousts where neither man nor sword could get ahead. Pellinore's blade was rough black iron and had no name. When we parried, the sword would growl threats, and I saw Pellinore smile when he heard them. _He_ listened to his blade. On the third joust, the nameless iron sword spoke with a smile in his voice as he said goodbye. And. I. Broke. Snapped in two. I felt the ghost pains of my hilt. Arthur fared not much better, as he was ripped to shreds, but Merlin stopped the king before Arthur could be slain. He should have stopped Pellinore before he slew me! And so, as Merlin carried the bloodied body of my wielder off, I lay in shards on the blood-watered mountain of the battlefield.

Oh, don't worry, Arthur was fine. He was taken to Nimue and given her famous blade. He left me on that mountaintop. No vengeance was taken for me. Pellinore and his unnamed weapon were admitted to the Round Table, of all things. I was left, broken, for hundreds upon hundreds of years. My name was forgotten, and most think it was the friggin' lake-sword who spent years in a rock, that it was all Excalibur and never Clarent.

This type of thing tends to make one bitter.

**_~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~_ **

 

As a sword lay on a mountaintop in Camelot, it slowly, over hundreds of years, died. Clarent, a warrior, died.

Warriors are meant to go but one place.

Hjörþrimul, the sword-wielding valkyrie, swept down to Midgard's plane, her horse galloping on thin wind. She reached down and swiped up the soul of a blade, looking now as beautiful and sharp as it had been when first forged.

"Hello, Clarent," the valkyrie's rough voice spoke gently. "It took a while, but I made it back."

"You never could arrive on time," grumbled the sword, who was unable to keep a smile out of his voice.

And thus, Clarent became a valkyrie blade once more in Valhalla.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written to the character pairing of "Self-Aware Magic Sword & Various Wielders Throughout Fantasy History." Some of the story comes from mythology and folklore, and some is fiction. The name, Hjörþrimul, was taken from a list of valkyrie names that appear in Norse literature and does mean "Sword Warrior." Finding the correct name of the sword from the stone was very tricky. The most distinct name that was not tied to other swords was Clarent. Clarent was broken in battle with Peilinore, who was later admitted to the Round Table. This is the bulk of what was researched and mythologically accurate. I'm afraid that, as far as I know, Avalon hasn't any socio-political ties to Alfheim. I hope you enjoyed my story.


End file.
